Fungal infections are prevalent in several clinical settings, particularly in immunocompromised patients. The emergence of resistance to antimycotics, in particular to the azoles, has increased interest in therapeutic and prophylactic vaccination against these fungi [1]. Among fungal pathogens, Candida albicans is one of the most prevalent. This organism is one of the principal agents of widespread opportunistic infections in humans and causes candidiasis, a condition which is found in both normal and immunocompromised patients. There have been several attempts to provide anti-Candida vaccines.
There is widespread consensus in the field of medical mycology that cellular immunity is critical for successful host defense against fungi [2], although the potential efficacy of humoral immunity in protecting against two major fungal pathogens (C. albicans and C. neoforzans) has attracted attention [2,3]. For C. neoformans, antibodies to the capsular glucuronoxylomannan have been shown to mediate protection in animal models of infection. For C. albicans, cell-surface mannoproteins are the dominant antigenic components [1] of C. albicans and antibodies to mannan, proteases and a heat shock proteins have been associated with protection against infection. Other vaccine candidates include: members of the asparlyl proteinase (Sap2) family; the 65 kDa mannoprotein (MP65) [4]; adhesion molecules isolated from phosphomannan cell wall complexes [5]; peptides which mimic epitopes from the mannan portion of the phosphomannan complex of Candida [6]; and hemolysin-like proteins [7].
It is an object of the invention to provide further and better antigens for inducing protective and/or therapeutic immune responses against infections, particularly against fungal infections.